Women on the Verge of a Financial Breakthrough

If you’ve bought six pairs of cheap, mediocre black leggings instead of one quality pair to “save money”, this episode is for you.

Caitlin invited her lifelong family friend who happens to be an international home-organizing legend and life-decluttering queen, Shira Gill, to talk about how owning less stuff can actually buy you more time, money, and mental peace.

What’s that like??

Caitlin admits she might be Pigpen from Peanuts if Pigpen also had a kid, a car full of granola bar wrappers, leaking dog water bowls, and a complicated relationship with Buy Nothing groups.

Shira tells us about her “rule of one” and Caitlin tries to hide her hostility towards someone who’s so “rational” and doesn’t have all available surfaces covered in 17-step projects that will never happen. (But seriously, what would you do with a maybe-non-working-but-maybe-valuable Frogger console from 1983??)

Shira gives lots of good, practical, non-judgy advice about managing external chaos and the tyranny of following clothing and parenting trends.

Oh! And Sara’s here too! She and Shira get in cahoots about how financial clutter and house clutter might actually be the same species.

We highly recommend getting lots more Shira (she takes up no counter space!) at @shira_gill on Instagram, on Substack or buy her latest book, LifeStyled!

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions, or just say hi! on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Welcome to another buzzkill week here on the Women on the Verge pod!

Close your eyes and think of the adult task YOU KNOW YOU SHOULD’VE ALREADY DONE but still haven’t….

Let’s learn about estate-planning!!! That’s the bad news. But the good news is our charming special guest Carlotta Garza-Kilcullen, an Austin-based estate planning attorney, helps the medicine go down very easily. By the end of your listen, you’ll want to find your own Carlotta to help you make a plan and sign it in all the right places.

What’s “power of attorney” and how can we get it for free without a lawyer? Carlotta tells us!

What are the risks of DIY online cheapo legal forms? Carlotta tells us!

Why aren’t estate plans one and done in our lifetimes? Carlotta tells us! (Though it’s a sore spot for Caitlin.)

Carlotta very nicely and supportively reminds us that estate plans aren’t just about death, they’re also about having a say in our lives if we lose capacity to make decisions for ourselves. The estate plan isn’t only a boring pile of documents with random initials and signature lines, she claims, it’s actually the empowerment plan that ensures what happens before and after your death aligns with your values and wishes. What do we think about this?

She also gives super helpful advice about how to find and screen a good estate-planning attorney when you get inspired. Team work makes the dream work!

Oh! Oh! Oh! And someone in this conversation got a shocking high school graduation present and it wasn’t Caitlin or Sara. Have you ever heard of this? What the what?

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions, or just say hi! on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Welcome to the career class you should’ve gotten in college. This week, Sara and Caitlin ask Susanne Aronowitz, career and executive coach, how to talk about compensation without sweating through our pantsuits.

How do we know what we’re worth? If they agree too fast to our ask did we go too low? If they say no, do we go back into our caves and never ask again?

What about writing a number down on a piece of paper? Is that ever the right move?

Susanne walks us through how to be our own She-Wolves of Wall Street, or at least learn how to approach these conversations with confidence and clarity. And helps us think outside the money box to bring all sorts of other things out on the negotiating table like benefits, flexibility, professional development and beyond.

If you’re currently fuming silently at your desk thinking “these bastards aren’t paying me enough,” but the idea of saying it out loud makes you want to crawl into the office supply closet, we’re here for you. Or, Susanne is here for you.

A little surprise here for the super avoidant is that a salary negotiation can actually be more of a collaborative “let’s make this work for both of us” conversation. Yes, please!

Also, here are a few resources Susanne recommends to do salary research:

o   www.dice.com/salary-calculator  

o   www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/know-your-worth.htm 

o   www.payscale.com 

o   Robert Half Legal Salary Guide

o   www.salary.com 

o   http://www.salaryexpert.com/

o   https://www.salarylist.com/

o   Top Salary Calculators Online

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions, or just say hi! on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Turns out money baggage isn’t suitcase jammed with hundred dollar bills - it’s the stuff we drag around from childhood that sneaks into every tap and Venmo request of our adult lives.

But don’t worry! Financial therapy, people. It’s a thing. And we have the wonderful Dr. Shaywanna Harris-Pierce on the pod to tell us all about it.

Maybe you avoid your credit card statements and just swipe and pray? (Dr. Shay said that and now it’s our motto.)

Maybe you’re living it up like yacht owner when your bank account is giving more…row boat with only one paddle?

Or maybe you’ve got plenty in savings but still won’t splurge on the guacamole add-on to your burrito?

If any of these apply to you, Dr. Shay is your person. She helps people sort through the feelings behind the finances. And how to work through those feelings to get in touch with your financial future.

Also, we talk about how most money advice seems written for rich white dudes named Chad, where to find guidance that speaks to a much wider range of experiences and backgrounds, especially for women and people of color. It’s really a lovely conversation and we think you’ll feel better after you listen.

Here’s where you can find Dr. Shay’s clinical practice, and here’s her podcast.

Other financial information resources and support Dr. Shay recommends:

- Strangers in Paradise: How Families Adapt to Wealth Across Generations by James Grubman

- Feel-Good Finance by Aja Evans

- Wealth in the Key of Life: Finding Your Financial Harmony by Preston D. Cherry

- BernaAnat, Financial Hype Woman

And finally, find your own financial therapist!

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions, or just say hi! on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

We’re back for season four, and ready to sneak into business class to live our best lives. Climb aboard!

Caitlin’s friend Katherine Fan is a credit card and loyalty programs expert who was The Points Guy's first senior travel reporter, and has covered credit cards for NerdWallet, Condé Nast Traveler, AFAR, and Business Insider. So, like, super profesh. She’s our guest to answer all of our questions about credit card points, travel hacking, and how she’s managed to see every continent (and by “see” she means get very close to) mostly on points. She just got her second passport, that’s how jet-set-y sophisticated she is. Now, she does also call herself a lounge rat, so there are some nuances here to dig into.

Listen for the discussion of how to convert your groceries into flights to Phoenix, stay for the repeated warnings to not get into this game if you might fudge it a bit on the want vs. need calculation for aspirational travel living. There is definitely some drama here. Like, did you know some of those fancy airport clubs stock their hot buffets with Sam’s Club hot dogs? (I think that’s what she said.)

Oh yeah - and the Eras Tour story! As usual, we have some advice for the “normal” people in how to start small and still feel like a travel hacking goddess.

Find Katherine on Instagram and subscribe to her Substack to catch all of her credit card tips and tricks so that you, too, can bask in the aquamarine waters of the Maldives, or just fly home to Guadalajara for your cousin’s high school graduation.

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions, or just say hi! on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Do you know anything about personal bankruptcy? Us neither. I mean, we knew the rumor that it ruins your credit and should be the OPTION OF LAST RESORT, but we actually didn’t know anything useful. Kind of the opposite - we knew just enough to be scared of it without any actual information. Sounds like the stock market all over again!

So, for our last episode of Season 3, we decided to learn about something together. Finally we’re both the dummies!

To walk us through the process, we invited Texas-based bankruptcy attorney Justice Pierce with Lincoln-Goldfinch Law. What a treasure! Justice is the most compassionate, understanding and knowledgeable expert we could’ve ever asked for.

We learned a lot. The most important thing was something we talk about a lot on the WOTV - the intersection of shame and money.

Guess what?

Bankruptcy is not a moral failing.

It’s just not. Justice explained that it’s actually a feature of the entire system that people are supposed to use. Politicians from both sides of the aisle support it - that’s how universally valued it is!

So, if it’s not a reason to tar and feather yourself because of you moral failures, what is it?

It’s actually a legal tool specially designed to help people escape overwhelming debt and start fresh that has different categories depending on what your situation is. Unexpected medical bills, job loss, or economic downturns can push even the most responsible people to their limits. But you know what, even people with some irresponsible blips also get our support.

But it ruins your credit forever!! OR DOES IT?

Listen as Justice tells us everything we didn’t know we wanted to know about this option.

Oh! And we realized after the episode that we didn’t ask her how much hiring a bankruptcy attorney costs. It sounds like anywhere between $4,000 - $5,000, depending on where you live. If you’re curious, call one and find out! Report back!

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions for….Season 4 (which will happen some day in the future!) on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Hey - if you’re super risk-averse (despite listening to our very soothing risk-encouraging podcast), this episode is for you!

Caitlin learns that her big investment idea to get an annuity so she gets paid some amount of money every year actually has nothing to do with investing. It’s insurance??? Get the F out of here, Sara. Do you even know what you’re talking about??

Sara goes on to explain that annuities are contracts with insurance companies to protect us from losing money in the stock market and guarantee a yearly income in our senior years. But ON THE OTHER HAND, you don’t get any of the advantages of compounding interest.

The lows are higher and the highs are lower. That doesn’t sound like the way to make a million dollars. And it’s not. Sara says that they really only appeal to the moooooost risk adverse humans who are okay with giving up the chance to make more money in the stock market in exchange for a sure thing.

In fact, we go so far as to claim that getting an annuity is more like a psychological strategy than an investing one. Look at us go! A couple of Freuds over here!

We even (lightly) touch on actuarial sciences! (I know that has nothing to do with Freud, but it’s also very sophisticated.)

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions for Season 3 on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Can’t I just sell some stocks to make a bunch of money and then use that money to make more money and then I’ll be rich?

Um. Sort of?

Sara explains how there’s no such thing as free lunch, or, in the stock market world, tax-free income from your clever little (or big) trades.

It’s all fun and games during the year while you’re buying low and selling high with individual stocks, but then, whoops!, there comes April and a tax bill for all of the money you earned for each transaction. Even though it might feel like “fun” money, you actually pay a higher income tax rate for quick trades! They don’t show that in the movies!

Caitlin (AGAIN) asks WTF she should do with her Airbnb stock now that she’s gone to therapy to become un-emotionally attached to it. Sara walks her through selling it at the price she would feel good about, and Caitlin might as well be considered a stock broker now.

Is buying individual stocks really worth it for normal people like you and me? Listen to this episode and decide for yourself.

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions for Season 3 on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

Did you listen to Season 3, Episode 1 where Caitlin grilled Sara about whether anybody ever knows if we’re in a recession or not, and Sara said we do because a brilliant economist named Claudia Sahm invented a rule called the Sahm Rule and male economists are always mansplaining the Sahm rule to Sahm?

If yes, then oh my god, you’ll never believe who our special guest is this week: Claudia Fucking Sahm! The economist who invented the Sahm rule!!!

Claudia Sahm, Chief Economist of New Century Advisors and former Federal Reserve economist, came on Women on the Verge of a Financial Breakthrough to answer our (Caitlin’s) dumb questions about her job and the economy.

Like, for instance, what is the Federal Reserve again? And, just to review for people that missed the last class: What is “economics” again? Hmmm. This is tricky.

Come listen in to Sara resisting the urge to ask all of her high-level fancy-pants-finance questions with every fiber in her body so Caitlin can complain about the price of Cheerios!

Here is Claudia’s Substack to get all of her research and thoughts into your inbox.

Ask us your dumb investing and finance questions for Season 3 on our Ask Us page!

We have the social medias!! Here’s our Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn.

This episode was edited by our co-producer Kelly West. Music by Bad Bad Hats and Devmo.

The wrong guy* is gonna win so the economy is going to go to hell in a hand basket and the stock market will tank and we’ll need our savings in the form of a pile of five dollar bills so we can buy milk and tangerines, right? (* I was gonna say “person” but who am I kidding? It’s always an effing guy.)

Sara explains how people always freak out about presidential elections and threaten to cash out their investment accounts because of the inevitable apocalypse. And then the apocalypse doesn’t actually come, and surprise, surprise, the cold-hearted stock market is entirely indifferent to who we elect or defeat.

Caitlin tries to catch Sara with some gotcha questions about specific areas of the economy that must suffer when the other side wins…only to be schooled, again. This time with a chart that even a Caitlin can understand.

Look on our website to see the Bespoke chart Sara refers to that shows what our investment accounts would look like if we only kept our money in the stock market when our person wins the presidency, and what it would look like if we just left it the fuck alone compounding its little (actually big) interest.

So, tune in to listen to Sara explain why all this fear mongering is way off base, and how we can thoughtfully respond to women that aren’t on the verge of a financial breakthrough with our facts and charts.

We’re not falling for this alarmist bullshit! (But it still seems kind of counter-intuitive, right??)